Best friends Amber, Tiffany, Michelle and Courtney perform as princesses at their local theme park, The Enchanted Park (which has seen better days) and are looking forward to their futures. However, as obstacles keep them from their perceived dreams, our heroines in Monica Gallagher‘s Part-Time Princesses (Oni Press, 2015), realize they can use their strengths and abilities to save their park from those who want to destroy it.

It’s refreshing to read a comic about teenage girls that’s not focused on them being misfits. Although our heroines are popular, they’re more Clueless than Mean Girls — they can be a bit self-involved but they’re well-meaning and each has her own motivations and interests, from the ambitious, smart Michelle to the dramatic Tiffany

Gallagher has a wonderful eye for fashion and the way teen girls actually interact. Each girl looks unique — down to her body type and style (Courtney is athletic and sporty, wannabe model Amber is tall and graceful). While Gallagher’s backgrounds are sparse, they focus the attention on her strong ability to convey personality and emotions through body language and facial expressions. The girls not only feel like friends to each other — they feel like girls you know.

While the story mostly proceeds with the expected beats as each girl finds her true abilities, there are a few curves — an unexpected romance, a hidden conspiracy — that keep the plot from feeling too obvious. Gallagher’s gift for the playful rhythms of life keep her storytelling strong and fresh.

As much as I love comics about girls and women in extraordinary circumstances (whether it’s real life or fantastic), it’s refreshing to read a graphic novel that’s about normal girls doing mostly normal things. I would love to see more comics like Part-Time Princesses in the world.

College (or university or your otherwise geographic equivalent) is a transitional time for most of us. It’s our first taste of freedom and adult responsibilities in a mostly low-risk environment.

Jamie Coe‘s Art Schooled (2014, Nobrow Press), focuses on this exact time through the eyes of Daniel, a young man from a small English town who goes to (you guess it!) art school in the big city. While it sometimes indulges in the expected navel-gazing young man stereotypes, Coe’s look at the ups and downs of the artist life is both sweet and satirical. While it’s not necessarily going to defy your expectations, there are surprises to be had here.

Our protagonist Daniel is a shy and awkward but completely normal young man. He comes into conflict with his roommates, embarrasses himself and quickly comes to realize art school is full of ridiculous people — both students and teachers alike. The book is told mostly through anecdotes — small vignettes about the creepy male model who poses for classes, visiting art galleries, the pretensions of other students.

The book is full of asides — Daniel offers up detailed portraits of the types of art students you’ll find, “person on the street” features where students answer questions such as “What’s the worst thing about art school?” for examples — and they give depth to the slightly generic plot (Daniel goes to art school! He meets a girl! He has self-doubt! He then finds his voice as an artist!). It was a wise choice on the part of Coe, letting Daniel’s inner life shine through in a playful way.

While Coe’s art does invoke a lot of the previous generation of indie-comics masters (you know who I’m talking about), he does shine with his ability to capture personalities through fashion and body language. His faces have a life of their own, revealing raw emotions clearly.

But the most striking part of Art Schooled is Coe’s inspired use of color and layout mark him as a distinctive talent. Greens compliment times when Daniel is smoking pot with his roommates, orange haze brings to mind the late-night glow of city streets. Tiny, multiple panels push fast-moving conversations and wide, page-filling images give space to smaller, quieter moments. Coe definitely understands the emotional language of comics.

As his first full-length graphic novel, Art Schooled announces Jamie Coe as an exciting talent. This book is fun. It will be even more fun to see what he does next.

(Coe will be Short Run in Seattle this weekend. I won’t be since I’m on the wrong side of the country and no one is paying to fly me out there.)

Review copy provided by publisher.

Briefly noted:

REM Pt. 1 by M.R. Trower — REM begins M.R. Trower’s dystopian sci-fi epic (I assume it’s going to be an epic, anyway). It’s one part Moebius, one part punk rock. Trower’s art is surreal and sensitive and the world feels fully developed. (You can catch up online but I just like print.)

Magical Beatdown Vo1. 1 & Vol. 1.5 by Jenn Woodall — Woodall takes the magical girl genre to its inevitable conclusion — super violence! — and the outcome could not be more delightful. Purposefully ridiculous and over-the-top, the swearing and the gore actually comes across as charming, and Woodall’s pastiche of manga tropes is fun. The two color printing (blue and hot pink) add nicely to the effect. I love this more than I should.

The Art of Cooking with Michelle, Chloe and Miaby Liz Brizzi — Liz Brizzi pointed me to her Kickstarter for her comic cook book. It looks super cute and I’m a huge fan of comics about food/recipe comics. There is about two weeks to go and she still needs about $5,000. She has a good selection of reasonably-priced rewards.

We first meet Bobo, sitting sullenly in the corner of her mom’s rambunctious 40th birthday party. Awkward and androgynous, she’s appealing and out of place. This is not a a world she wants to be a part of, but you immediately want to be a part of hers.

It’s 1982 in Sweden and everyone keeps telling Bobo that “punk is dead.” Bobo knows different. Punk isn’t a genre of music. It’s a feeling you have in your heart.

Lucas Moodysson’s We Are the Best!, based on his wife’s, Coco Moodysson, semi-autobiographical comic, Never Goodnight, is the punk-rock movie you didn’t know you wanted but absolutely needed. It’s one of the few movies that gives absolutely respect to the inner life of girls. There is nothing here that makes fun of them. They are treated as the absolute forces of nature that they are.

The reserved Bobo and her more antagonistic friend, Klara, decide to form a band on whim — mostly to show up a few jerky teenage boys that made fun of them. Despite not being able to play instruments (or know anything about music), they decide to write a song about how much they hate gym class. In the process, they befriend the talented but conservative Hedvig.

The three girls’ friendship is at the core of the movie. They are all open and sweet, and the three young actresses (Mira Barkhammar, Mira Grosin and Liv LeMoyne) bring a natural quality to their roles. Some scenes feel improvised and the chemistry between the three is a delight. Even when they come into conflict over boys (stupid boys!), it is such a minor part of their journey. The band is the most important thing! It’s so refreshing to see a movie that celebrates female friendship in such a way.

There is sweetness at the core of this movie — all three girls come from loving families. While Bobo’s parents are separated, they both still care about her. Klara’s family is wild but supportive and while Hedvig’s family is presented as being a bit more uptight, her mother just has her best interests at heart. The lack of conflict grounds the movie. The girls don’t really have much to rebel against, no, but that makes them feel real and honest. Maybe there are bigger problems than gym teachers, but these girls are fighting against what they know to fight against. I’d be excited to catch up with them in a few years.

This is a kind-hearted movie that shows the power of girls to change their worlds. I am not 13 but I still want to go start a band now. It’s never too late to be a punk.

How does fame affect creativity and art? That seems to be the central question of Julie Maroh‘s Skandalon (2014, Arsenal Pulp Press). While I know it’s absolutely likely that Maroh started work on this book before Blue is the Warmest Color became an international success, it’s also hard not to see this book as a prescient answer to the pressures of being in the spotlight without really wanting it.

Skandalon focuses on a French rock star who goes by the name of Tazane. He’s talented, gorgeous and moody. He’s also a predator (sexual and otherwise) because he can be. He’s not a particularly likable lead, but he’s one that’s interesting to watch. Readers first meet him when he’s already famous so we don’t see where he came from (although there’s hints about it). Instead, we’re just witnesses to his fall.

While it’s highly allegorical, Maroh does her best to make it feel personal. While it’s hard to feel connected to Tazane himself, her use of color — dark reads, washed out greens, warm pinks, deep blues — to set tone and pace creates a beautiful, sensitive tone. Her panels look like individual paintings and give the story a dreamy quality. For a book about a rock star, there is an astonishing amount of silence in her art. Word balloons often feel like an intrusion as Maroh communicates her story through images alone. Her gift for taking the explicit expressiveness of manga and transforming it into her own style has only gotten stronger. If nothing else, Skandalon is an amazing book visually.

Unfortunately, the story falls short of where it should be. I admire what Maroh was reaching for and while I certainly don’t need to like the main character to enjoy a story, Tazane never quite grasped my empathy. Intellectually, I knew what Maroh was trying say, but I didn’t feel much about anything that happened to anyway toward the end. I missed the visceral, emotional core that Blue is the Warmest Color had. The story was more ambitious but obviously less personal for Maroh, and that shows.

Still, I’d rather see someone reach and fail than not reach at all. I admire that Maroh tried to explore these topics and she’s still a masterful artist. Even if I feel a bit mixed in the end on Skandalon, it still joins the company of books I will continue to think about and revisit. In that way, it’s nothing but a success.